


and i'm holding on (i'm holding on)

by Ymae



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: (also it breaks my heart), Alex doesn't know Kara is Supergirl, Alex finds out Kara is Supergirl, Danvers sisters story, Gen, Guns, Gunshot Wounds, and it costs them, somewhere around 4x12
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-07
Updated: 2019-05-05
Packaged: 2019-11-13 13:24:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18032546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ymae/pseuds/Ymae
Summary: Not wanting to reveal her alien identity to a clueless Alex, Kara reacts too slowly to a man threatening her sister.But with Alex held at gunpoint, what can Kara Danvers possibly do?





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from 'Really Gone' by Chvrches (yes, that one :)

There’s a gun pointed at Alex.

A tall, blonde man, his golden mask ripped off, has it in a tight grip. In his other hand, there’s a crumpled piece of paper with a bad shot of Alex’s face on it, _Director Alexandra Danvers_ scribbled over it with black marker. With her x-ray vision, Kara sees what’s written on the back: That the director of the DEO is working with Supergirl, that she’s sided with the aliens. That the DEO will stand for what it’s supposed to, the eradication of alien life, once Alex Danvers has been killed. 

Alex is on the Children of Liberty’s hit list, and Kara feels  _so_ angry for not seeing it before. She feels  _furious_ at how badly the government seems to protect its employees, how Colonel Haley is more focused on discovering Supergirl’s secret identity than making sure Alex’s is protected. 

Mostly, though, Kara is scared.

Because Alex, in civilian clothes, jeans, t-shirt, leather jacket, taking a casual stroll on a warm evening with her sister, now stands in the middle of the sidewalk, her whole body tense and eerily still, because she’s being held at gunpoint.

“You do not have to do this,” she’s saying now, not a tremble in her voice, though Kara can hear every erratic beat of her heart, every shaky breath. “You joined the Children of Liberty because you think aliens pose a threat, didn’t you? But if they are dangerous doesn’t matter now. Not if you and your group start killing actual people. Aliens, humans. Are you a murderer? Are you really capable of driving a bullet through my heart?”

Kara can’t tell if Alex is holding herself up well or not. She can’t move, can’t breathe. She knows that Alex has done this before, has seen it play out countless times. Those moments have been some of the worst of her life; when Alex’s life is at risk so pointlessly, recklessly. They can do all the talking they want, but one slip of a shaking finger on a trigger and her sister is gone.

“Kara!”

She barely registers the words. She’s in shock. Alex is capable. Alex is strong. But ever since the mind wipe, her brain tends to go haywire a bit. What if this is it?

“Kara, _dammit_!” Alex hisses. 

Kara’s head snaps upwards.

The man with the gun is watching them with a kind of wary interest, the kind that’s dangerous when you add any power at all. And power is the one thing he has right now. Power over one life, a single one. The most important one.

“Alex, turn around,” Kara begs. “Please. He’s going to kill you.”

“We don’t know what he wants,” Alex replies softly. She doesn’t know that Kara has seen the crumpled piece of paper in his hand. She doesn’t know that Kara has experience recognizing the fear darkening Alex’s eyes, that she knows that when someone points a gun at your head and you’re not bulletproof, there’s a good chance you won’t make it. She sees Kara, and she sees someone soft, someone in need of protection at all costs. No matter how much Alex says she’s going to take care of herself, no matter how much she recognizes her self-destructive tendencies, there’s a switch in her mind that turns on when she thinks Kara is in danger, and that switch narrows her thoughts down to one very simple thing: survival.

Kara’s, and then, maybe, if there’s time, her own.

“Director Danvers,” the blonde man calls. “We are the Children of Liberty. Tell us Supergirl’s secret identity, and we’ll let you live.”

“I don’t know who she is, and even if I did, I’d still tell you to fuck off,” Alex snaps, and turns around one last time to mouth to Kara, _get out of here._

_He’ll kill you,_ Kara mouths back. 

Alex’s lips twitch sadly. She musters a smile, a special one for Kara and Kara alone. “I love you,” she says.

Kara’s hands twitch.

“Move, and she dies,” the man reminds her.

“Don’t move, and you’ll die too,” Alex contradicts him. Something in Kara’s chest tightens so hard it’s going to explode. Why has Alex stopped trying to talk him out of it? She was on a good path. She needs to have been on a good path.

“Director Danvers, I know your organization keeps records of all aliens of the United States. Give us the access code, and you’ll live.”

“Go to hell,” Alex says. Kara sees her fists tighten, trying to reach the knife hidden under her belt. But a knife won’t do it. Even with Alex’s superior fighting skills, that just won’t do it.

“I won’t hesitate to shoot a woman,” he warns her.

Alex laughs dryly.

“But will you shoot a person?”

The few people around them have stopped walking, taken their phones out, called the police. But Kara knows they won’t arrive in time.

“Is this really how you want to live your life? Following orders you’ll never understand from people who are much, _much_ smarter than you?” she hears Alex snarl. 

Kara wishes she were on comm. What would she give still to be working with the DEO, to have J’onn’s calming voice in her ear, telling her what to do, what to negotiate, to keep calm. Kara feels every ray of the evening sun on her skin. Her senses are even more heightened than they usually are, and the heat of the sun burns her skin, the dust in the air closes up her throat, the dry parchment under her feet is so hard and unforgiving she might collapse before she even sees what’ll happen to her sister.

“Is that why you’re trying to kill me? ‘Cause I’m smarter than you?”

Why is Alex mocking him? He’s literally about to shoot her. The only reason he doesn’t is because he has orders that getting information out of Alex is more valuable than her death.

Kara sees the back of the paper, and the words  _DON’T TAKE IN NOT ENOUGH RESOURCES TO KEEP CONSTRAINED_ written there in big, bold letters. Alex is a badass, and the Children of Liberty seem to know it. Kara feels oddly proud while at the same time angry. 

Also, terrified. They’ve clearly been planning this for a while. If they hadn’t evaluated her too ‘difficult’ to keep locked up, there could’ve been a Rick Malverne situation. The Children of Liberty could have gotten to Alex while she was alone in her apartment, taken her in, questioned her for information, tortured it out of her, even.

Alex has been through all that already, ten times over, and in hindsight it makes Kara want to _scream_. Alex is so human, so vulnerable in all her toughness. Kara should have gone to greater measures to protect her. Or to any measures at all, really.

She’d thought they’d been making progress. She’d thought maybe it was for the best if Alex never remembered who Supergirl really was. She’d thought maybe she’d begun to take care of herself.

She’d been wrong.

Because this—these two minutes they’ve been standing here, Alex’s life dangling over an abyss—it all could have been avoided.

“You hate Supergirl because she’s tougher than you,” Alex is saying right now, spitting the words like they’re acid against an impervious foe. “Because she’s right. Supergirl is what you Children of Liberty could never be; a hero.”

Kara closes her eyes with one final, heartbreaking realization.

Alex doesn’t know Supergirl in her reality, not really. Doesn’t trust her. But in some crucial part of her, her protective mechanisms are still all hidden and working on their highest to keep her alive.

One of them being, when in need, a word to say isn’t  _come,_ or  _I’m here,_ or  _help._ The word to say is  _Supergirl._

Alex is stalling because a part of her is straining to keep up hope, hope that Supergirl will swoop in and shield her from the impending gunfire. But Supergirl isn’t coming. Supergirl is already here. Supergirl failed.

When a masked man with a gun had run out of the alley, yelling for everyone to get out of the way, she could’ve changed quickly, could’ve gotten Alex to safety, the man unarmed in a second. But Kara hesitated. Let Alex push her behind her, shield her with her body, which had slowed Alex down, made her prioritize her fragile sister’s safety over her own. If Alex hadn’t offered to have her mind wiped, to have every part of her that knows her little sister isn’t so helpless eradicated, she’d have shot Kara one look, and Supergirl would have taken the bad guy out in a matter of seconds.

But Kara had hesitated, just a second too long, to reveal herself. And then it had already been too late.

The man is unstable, like all monsters, and if Kara moves, even in super speed, there’s a fifty-fifty chance her sister will die before she gets to her. And fifty-fifty is if they’re lucky.

She can’t risk it.

She can’t risk doing nothing.

“Shoot me now, if that’s what you want,” Alex says with a voice hard as steel, only her eyes softening up a bit as she looks behind her and sees Kara still standing there, frozen on the spot. “ _Supergirl_ will hunt you down.” 

Alex doesn’t even like Supergirl now. But she’s desperate. Kara can’t hear it in her voice, but she can see it in the way her hands tighten mechanically, all her training kicking in at once. And that last uttering of her name sizzles in Kara’s ear like a match that’s been struck.

She charges forward, and the gun fires. Kara sees it flying through the air as though in slow-motion because she’s going so fast.  _Faster than a speeding bullet._

She’s fast, but Alex’s reflexes are honed and always lying in wait, like coiled wire. She turns her body in front of the bullet, between it and Kara, the moment Kara moves so much as a finger. It fires off into her shoulder.

Alex’s screams go through Kara’s skin and bones all the way to her broken heart.

“Kara, go, go, go, go!” Alex yells through tightly clenched teeth, her balance wavering as her legs threaten to give out. Kara can’t tell if Alex has registered her use of super-speed at all. Alex is in protective mode, mindful of everything in the world but herself, and in the split second that her pain makes Kara hesitate, the man charges forward and wraps an arm around Alex’s neck.

“That was some speed you just had,” he declares, like this is the most important thing and not the bleeding woman he has by the throat.

“Let her go, and I’ll tell you everything,” Kara promises. The tight pastel pink skirt she’s wearing goes all the way down to her knees. It constricts, and she suspects it’s made her twice as slow—no use for speed if she can’t even move her legs properly.

On top of it, Alex looks at her like she’s alien. Her eyes are glassed over, from the blood loss or the pain or the fact that her little sister is displaying Supergirl’s powers, Kara isn’t sure.

But Alex’s loyalty wins. It always does.

“I don’t know how you did that,” she whispers, her voice raspy as she fights against the arm tightening at her throat. “But, Kara, please. Get out of here.”

The man’s right hand is soon soaked red with Alex’s blood. His fingers clutch at her throat, and the gun is pressed into Alex’s side. She coughs violently, her spit stained dark red.

“Let her go,” Kara pleads. “You want Supergirl’s identity? You can have it. Just hand her over to me.”

The man looks at her with contempt, as though to note down her begging in his private book of victories. “You just revealed yourself,” he says smugly, the insecurity vanished from his eyes entirely now. “Kara Danvers. You’d been on our suspect list. You were the first of our test subjects, the one that fit best. It explains so much, doesn’t it? With the sister you have. Now it’s all clear to us, why the DEO strayed from its original path so… unfortunately in the last few years.” He tightens his hold, and Kara sees, hears, feels, she can practically taste Alex’s pained gasps for air, her fingers loosening, feebly grasping for hold.

“This experiment is why we developed the bullets,” the man explains. “They’re faster than even you, Supergirl. As I’m sure you’ve noticed.”

“Please,” Kara begs, tears burning on her cheeks.

The man laughs, pushing Alex down on the hard concrete. He raises the gun and fires another shot. Alex screams as the bullet tears through her leg.

“I suggest you let me get away,” the man says, dangerously quiet. “Or we put one through her heart.”

He gives her one last, hateful look, then he turns around and hurries into the dark alley.

Kara drops down on the concrete, where her sister’s blood is pooling under her body, filling Kara’s mouth with air that tastes revoltingly metallic. Kara pushes down the urge to gag, collects Alex into her arms, hoping desperately she’ll be able to fly in Kara Danvers’ stupid sweater and her stupid goddamn skirt.

She discards her glasses, her shoes, and leaps into the sky. Tuning her ears in on Alex’s heartbeat. Listening for signs of life.


	2. Chapter 2

“I know a lot about you, Supergirl… I know your name. I know where you live, how you dress, what you eat. I know the sound of your sister screaming.”

Kara shakes her head. She tries to block out the voice, but she can hear bulldozers working halfway across the city, the cartoon playing in an apartment three blocks away, a student tapping on their chair in boredom hundreds of feet below. Her senses are overloading her brain with information in a way they haven’t in a very long time.

The sweet smell of crushed flower petals three streets ahead makes Kara gag. It mixes with the copper taste of blood in her mouth, and her arms begin to shake. She sags a little in the air, her fingers almost slipping off Alex’s blood-soaked shirt, and she has to jerk upward violently to keep her speed.

The gunman’s voice finally fades out of her ear. Kara clenches her teeth, because as much as it relieves her not to have to hear his boasting anymore, it means she won’t be able to track him. It’ll make throwing him in a cell for what he did to Alex so much harder.

Kara’s hands are red with blood. Her sister is burning up with fever. She wants to do so much more than throwing a man’s ass in jail. She wants to feel his jaw break. She wants to taste his regret.

But these are not Supergirl’s thoughts, honorable Supergirl. They’re Kara Danvers’. Sweet Kara Danvers, who’s known her sister for all her life on Earth, who’s had to watch her memories slip away, who’s had to hear her scream. There’s nothing she’d rather do than hunt that man down. Nothing except for—

“Kara?”

Hearing Alex’s voice. Kara’s body suddenly pulls a switch, and her senses narrow down to hyperfocus. She looks into her sister’s pale face, a smile tugging at the corners of her eyes.

“Hey. We’re almost there.”

Alex’s tongue brushes over her dry lips. She tries to lift her head, moaning quietly, but doesn’t have enough strength. It breaks Kara’s heart, and she only flies faster. It’s been less than thirty seconds since her take-off, but it feels like she’s already failed Alex.

“You’re not—” Alex’s voice is rough and almost toneless.

“Shh. Don’t talk.”

Alex’s eyes flutter open, but they soon drop close again. “—J—J’onn, are you?”

Kara smiles painfully, the wind whipping against a stray tear on her cheek.

It’s a way out. An explanation for Alex’s feverish brain, one that might even make sense to Alex if—when she’s fine again. It would mean burdening J’onn with Alex’s possible confusion, with why he wouldn’t have just stepped in front of her the instant her attacker stepped into their path, but Kara knows J’onn would gladly take anything on himself if that meant protecting them.

“I’m not,” she whispers. “I’m your sister. I’m sorry.”

The DEO building comes into sight, glinting in the sun. Kara exhausts her last adrenaline resources, clutches Alex tighter to her chest, and speeds into the DEO. She’s greeted with red flashing lights and agents yelling  _“perimeter breach!”,_ and presses her hands to Alex’s ears until they switch off the sirens. 

Her costume is on, no cape and her shirt facing the wrong direction—no shoes, either—but enough so that she’ll be recognized as Supergirl. She appreciates the increased effectiveness of the DEO under Alex’s lead as the doctors wheel in a stretcher without asking questions.

But she wonders—discarding her bloodied blouse and skirt out the window, she wonders—if that singular moment of truth really had been a selfless decision. If Alex really is better off knowing her sister is the Children of Liberty’s target number one.

She still wonders as Supergirl sits on a metal bench in the hallway leading to the medbay. She only stops thinking about her own selfishness when she hears the doctors yelling orders, hears of dangerous blood loss and a high risk of Alex’s body going into shock, of broken bones and twisted luck.

Then, finally, Kara allows herself to lean her head against the cool wall. She draws her legs up to her body and curls her hands around her knees. All the energy leaves her body. Kara sobs.

 

* * *

 

An hour passes. Another, and another, and though the sterile neon lights don’t dim an ounce, and Kara doesn’t move, she could swear that night has already broken into the building. Everything looks gray with a tinge of blue, the metal walls plain and scrubbed like a washed-out sweater. It’s so unfamiliar, though it’s practically been the Danvers sisters’ second home for years. Even with J’onn and Winn gone, there was a certain kind of comfort in the clean, chrome-and-steel lines of the DEO.

Now, it’s a government workplace.

Kara feels lonely and like she’s being watched at the same time. Like a hospital, but less crowded; like a bureau, but less crisp; like Kara’s apartment early at night, when there’s cold pizza and an old movie is on and Alex is working late.

Kara wriggles in her shirt until it’s the right way around again, but her family crest doesn’t bring the same comfort as usual. It’s a symbol of a world that blew up in dust, a house that existed long before all this, long before Alex. And right now, there’s no one but Alex.

Nobody tells her anything. Kara’s super hearing reaches the medbay and scatters as soon as there’s a hope of hearing Alex’s heart beat.

(If it’s even still beating.)

They must have put up blocking devices.

They’d tell her if Alex was dead… wouldn’t they?

Kara wants to go down there so badly, to see her sister in one of those medbay beds that she’s probably slept in more than her own apartment (that’s a lie, though it can’t be that far off) but she’s terrified that they’re going to use Kryptonite on her, that they’ll make her abandon Alex.

So she holds her ground.

 

* * *

 

It’s four hours and fifty-two minutes later that a doctor approaches her. Her hair is jet black and cropped short, her name is Asha Basu, and Kara remembers Alex and her sometimes going for drinks back when Kara still thought Alex worked in a lab. Alex was always going on about her talents and her roommate who worked for NASA until Asha and she were a little better acquainted and ‘roommate’ turned into ‘girlfriend’. Alex stopped talking about her then, way before Asha was injured badly and came back two years later with a prosthesis, a medical degree, and a wife.

When Kara thinks about it, Alex had probably had a crush on Asha, long before Maggie came along and Alex out as a lesbian.

It saddens Kara, all those missed opportunities. Alex would have been cute with a girlfriend in college, with med school and a simple life. She wonders if Alex knows about Asha; if she, too, wonders why she never had time to figure out herself. Having a human little sister, sweet and independent like Kara never was, what would Alex’s life have looked like? What does it look like in her head?

Kara swallows hard. She hasn’t permitted herself to think about this, because there was no volcano she could’ve screamed all her sadness into, but there’s so much more at stake than just Alex’s sister being Supergirl. Her whole life was wiped out and thrown over, and now it’s about to be messed with again.

Kara’s breathing is erratic. She digs her fingernails into the bench beneath her, her bare feet pushing against the floor, and the metal cracks in the same moment as the concrete crumbles.

What are missed opportunities against opportunities Alex might never get to have?

Asha was tough as nails even before the accident. She barely flinches at Supergirl’s show of anxiety, simply takes another step with a schooled face that has just a touch of a smile to it, like spilled paint, not enough to be caught by a camera.

The paranoia is new, and it just adds to the eerie unfamiliarity of the DEO. But Kara can’t see that, can only feel the feeling of Alex’s battered body in her arms.

Alex pushed down on the concrete, dark blood pooling under her. The gun aimed at her heart, the fragile life smudged on the outlines of a terrorist’s hands.

One shot. Two.

The fear darkening Alex’s eyes as she stood tall, a protector, a lunatic, a sister.

Kara forces a smile, kneeling down and smoothing over the ground until the crumbled concrete is pressed into a flat, broken pattern. “I’m sorry,” she says to Asha, keeping her voice as calm as possible. Maybe it’s good she’s been focusing on Alex so much; her brain hasn’t had time to process the fact that the Children of Liberty know her  _identity._ That everything she’s built over the past years, all the accumulated secrets, the sacrifices made for protection, is being crushed. 

They’re probably already up in her apartment, trashing her DVDs, ripping up her extra-soft blankets, stomping on her photos. There’s probably already an email in Lena’s inbox, revealing who her dedicated reporter friend really is. There’s probably already an announcement on the internet. Or they’re looking into more blackmail material. All of Kara’s friends, her family. J’onn, Nia, and Brainy have powers to protect themselves, but James? Lena? Eliza?

How did she land on their suspect list, anyway? Did Kara Danvers publish one pro-alien article too many?

_She should’ve kept a lower profile._

Through all the catastrophic thoughts, guilt is the only thing that reaches her. A life in tatters? She’d still have  _something_ if she didn’t have Supergirl. But if that thing, that person got taken away from her—that’s all she can care about right now. The rest, even the rest of the people she loves, is trapped behind a glass wall, screaming at her soundlessly. It doesn’t reach her.

Maybe that makes her a bad person, but much has happened since Kara risked Alex’s life just so she wouldn’t give into Rick Malverne. She’s lost too much since then to lose her sister now.

“It’s fine,” Asha replies flatly. Chills creep down Kara’s spine.

“Tell me Director Danvers is okay,” she demands, straightening to her whole superhero power stance despite herself.

“Colonel Haley requires your report immediately,” Asha replies.

“I don’t think you understand,” Kara pleads. “I just want to know if she’s alive. _Please._ ” She closes her eyes not to have to see the answer in Asha’s eyes before she says it out loud. 

Asha is smart, but she really does not understand. Kara’s whole body is tensed up, ready to snap or deflate. Every inch of her feels the urgency of the situation. Kara’s been hearing Alex’s heartbeat since she was twelve years old; it’s a pattern instilled to her deeper than shared blood ever could.

She wonders if the doctors know the cruelty of the blocking devices, how they drain Kara completely of her only way to reach Alex.

Of course, if she’s far enough away, even just across the city, the sound becomes too quiet to notice. But it’s still there, vibrating in Kara’s bones; only when she’s forced to notice its absence, it  _hurts._

Like every time Alex is kidnapped. Like when she’s drowning in a tank, or half unconscious lying on some abandoned warehouse’s dirty floor.

Like never when she’s safe in the DEO’s medbay, because then, Kara is near her. Napping beside her bed. Holding her hand.

“No, I don’t think _you_ understand,” Asha retorts with sudden intensity. It’s almost eerie, the wild eyes set in a perfect poker face. “Colonel Haley knows you’ve been here this entire time. Since you declared war on the DEO—”

“I didn’t—”

“—the President has issued there to be Kryptonite on the ready. If they think you’re a threat, they’ll shoot you. Haley’s already treading a line by allowing you to stay here, and don’t think it’s because she likes you. The only way they _might_ turn off the sound blockers is if you comply completely.” 

Of course, they know that the blockers will fuck up Supergirl. Of course, Haley does.

It makes Kara sick to the stomach. It reminds her of the whole reason for the mind wipe; of the urgency of having Alex have power inside the DEO. She hates it, but at least it makes some of this less meaningless.

“I just want to see her,” Kara whispers. “If she’s not dead yet.” The possibility makes her dizzy again.

Asha studies her carefully. “Are you Director Danvers’ girlfriend?”

“Absolutely not,” Kara says, and wants to slap herself for it. She might’ve just lost the only way to gain Asha’s sympathy.

But if anything, the doctor’s face lights up, and Kara’s paranoid brain tells her that that’s realization in Asha’s eyes, that she recognizes her coworker-turned-boss’s quirky younger sister from several years ago.

And maybe she does.

“Alex is alive,” she says promptly. The use of her sister’s first name doesn’t go past Kara. Maybe they’re better acquainted than she realized, but anyway, now she’s sure Asha’s on her side.

And beyond that.

_Beyond that._

Tears spring to Kara’s eyes before she even gets to speak. They just start running down her face, wetting her shirt, like a physical manifestation of her relief.

One shot. Two.

Concrete turned red.

Alex’s screams.

Still, she’s breathing. Of course she is.

Kara presses a hand to her mouth. She feels dizzy.

“She’s stable physically, though I can’t promise this was the last operation she’ll have to go through,” Asha confides with a low voice. “But she’s erratic mentally. You know, talking about her sister. She’s extremely upset. We’ve had to keep the meds to a minimum, we can’t be sure she doesn’t have a concussion. Colonel Haley visited her once and heard her say _Supergirl_ and _identity_ in the same sentence, and we haven’t been allowed to call the Director’s emergency contacts since.” 

“That’s unethical,” Kara says, her throat tightening.

“Don’t get me wrong, Haley’s not a monster,” Asha explains. “But she’s wrong about some things, and those are the ones she’s intense about. She’s upset about Danvers—”

Kara snorts.

“No, she is. She said it’s a shame how close they got, whoever shot her. But like I said, she’s wrong about you, about that you’re supposed to reveal your identity to her; she doesn’t see there are _people_ who’ll get hurt if you do,” Asha emphasizes, and now Kara’s eighty percent sure she knows. Maybe she’s like Maggie, and is aware that there are approximately three people in Alex’s life that have her trust. Kara being blonde and the only one that Asha’s met, and now Supergirl having a near panic attack over a random agent’s injury, maybe she’s connected the dots. “And she used to think that Danvers knows something, and with her history of cheating polygraphs, Haley seems to be sure she evaded the truth seeker somehow. And that she’ll slip up if she’s drugged, apparently.” 

“You don’t think—” Kara brushes a hand across her face, clearing her throat. “That she’d—you know, hurt her?”

No matter what they sacrifice, it never seems to be enough. Even now, Alex is in danger just because she’s Supergirl’s sister, even though she didn’t even know that a few hours ago. Even though they’ve eradicated every trace of it from her mind, leaving Kara’s heart to be crushed every single day. With every  _I would really appreciate it if you would address me as Director Danvers_ and  _I’m totally blanking_ and  _what are you gonna do, interview him?,_ and  _Supergirl_ said with zero emotion. 

It’s still not enough. They’ve ripped their chests open to make sure Kara’s identity was protected, and it’s still not near enough.

“No, no,” Asha reassures her firmly. “Haley wouldn’t torture Alex just to get what she wants.” Kara flinches at her honesty. “It’s against protocol, and immoral on top of that. You know, Supergirl, don’t worry about that. Alex won’t slip up, she never does. Just—report to Haley, for your good and the Director’s. I’ll go check in on her.”

“Okay—” Kara says, but Asha has already turned away, walking swiftly down the corridor.

Kara is left standing beside a broken bench, with bare feet and hope and fear clinging tight to each other in her eyes.

 

* * *

 

Kara feels like a little kid, sitting on a chair at the briefing room table, pen in her hand, a few sheets titled  _CIVILIAN REPORT_ in front of her. They’re badly printed, clearly meant to be filled out on the computer—icons and even a captcha for some reason. But Supergirl isn’t to be trusted on the DEO servers, and the  _civilian_ part is probably supposed to be another punch in the gut. 

It’s good. It means Haley’s undermining how important Alex is to Supergirl, acting as though she cares about small-print bureaucracy right now.

Okay. Maybe she does care.

Maybe she’s fantasizing about burning clean through the papers, table and everything, about superspeeding Alex out of here where she isn’t under the control of a woman who follows orders right as they come through, like the President’s demands equal a moral code. But she knows that the DEO’s doctors have better equipment than about all of the country’s hospitals.

Kara doesn’t have her phone with her—it’s in her cape pocket, she doesn’t even want to think about where she dropped her cape while changing on the way here—and she hasn’t even bothered asking Haley for a call. She hasn’t even seen her in person. Or heard anything from Alex since Asha’s off-record information.

The report in front of her is just a couple of crossed-out lines, smudged by Kara’s helpless tears. She’s a reporter, dammit, but every lie she writes screams  _failure._ Screams  _I can save everyone until it matters._ Or, worse, makes it sound like she let Alex get shot on purpose. 

_I’m bulletproof and faster than a speeding bullet and that’s why Alex Danvers was shot two times—_

The man said the bullets were developed especially to out-do her powers, but how could she write that? How can she explain why they were aimed at Alex?

Kara presses the pen deep into the paper, draws swirls spiraling into each other until the paper tears and the pen crunches under her fingers. She throws it over the table, frustrated, and it dents the metal surface.

Tears spring into Kara’s eyes. She’s so sick of them. So sick of the anger bubbling in her fingers, the despair twisting under her skin.

Kara is so sick of feeling helpless, and how every time she feels that way, it feels like it’s never been this bad.

Even when her powers blew out, when she almost couldn’t save Alex from drowning, there was at least someone standing beside her, holding her tight. This is like the day Krypton exploded, isolating and utterly lonely. Minus the claustrophobia and plus the bureaucracy.

Kara pushes back her chair and stands up. It clatters to the ground. She hates that she’s breaking so much here but not enough, that it’ll piss Haley off but that technically the repairs would be Alex’s job.

She storms through the door, down the stairs, into the DEO’s hallways, leading to various training rooms, tech rooms, probably a hundred lockdown mechanisms and self-destruction buttons and secret Kryptonite hiding spaces.

She really should’ve asked Alex to have all that lead ripped out.

She passes by agents shooting her alarmed looks—and now she’s paranoid, because they’re not all the President’s minions, she’s known some of them for years—until she reaches the bench she sat on earlier… last night. Because from what it looks like, it’s early in the morning now. The bench is still broken, but someone picked up the bigger chunks of metal and piled them up neatly on the less damaged half of the bench.

Suddenly, the pile of metal vibrates. And then again. Again. It even lights up.

The metal is streaked with lead, so Kara shoves it aside, and there it is: a phone. The flip kind, old and scratched,  _6 messages_ written on the screen. 

It’s not locked.

Kara’s fingers tremble as she opens the messages.  _Goodwin_ is written on top. They read:

_Ka_

_ra i’m awake Asha says she’ll type for me it’s hurting my head but I don’t want her to_

_i’m fine_

_please come anyways Haley stares at me they won’t call you_

_are you getting this?_

_I think they drugged me. love you_

“Alex,” Kara whispers, cradling the flip phone in her hand. They’re dated from an hour to half an hour ago. Alex must have been waiting for her, believed in her even though Kara lied.

She won’t have to wait anymore.

 

* * *

 

Kara marches through the DEO again. This time, not as angrily nor as fast; this time, the sun streaming through the window doesn’t sting in her eyes, but falls softly on the floor, pointing out the dust on the computers, the agents’ dirty shoes, the humanity of it all. The simplicity.

Kara spots Colonel Haley across the room, standing in a gray suit with her hands clasped behind her back, and she hurries her steps.

She approaches the medbay. It smells like cleaning agent even from a distance, the colors a little different from the rest of the DEO; not polished metals, but blues and whites, and the machines don’t hum quietly, they beep. They record life.

Kara doesn’t know why she thought there would be guards outside the medbay, like Alex is some kind of prisoner. There  _is_ a sealed metal suitcase with what might be Kryptonite in it, but no one to use it. Like a threat that’s just that; a warning. 

Okay, it’s not quite that simple. There are two armed DEO agents patrolling in the area around the medbay, and there are clusters of doctors and scientists a few rooms away, but Kara knows the DEO. It’s early morning, which means that agents go home from the night shift, and the rush of daytime people isn’t quite there yet. It’s never been a problem because J’onn literally lived at the DEO, Supergirl is always available, and Alex’s work time is a mystery (apart from sister nights, Kara has no idea if Alex even uses her apartment anymore or if she’s just taken over J’onn’s old bed). But now that J’onn quit, Supergirl was fired, and Alex was shot, early morning DEO is severely understaffed.

Kara has approximately ten minutes until the patrol comes by the medbay again.

She opens the door.

 

* * *

 

“Alex?”

Kara lingers beside the door, her mood kind of undecipherable, even to herself. Everything is muted in here, like the volume of the world has been turned down just to let Alex sleep. It’s not the nightmare prison Kara’s mind had made it out to be, and for that, she’s glad.

Still, the white-scrubbed colors of the medbay are too familiar. The thin stretchers with blue and white bedspreads, the blinking monitors with smart stats flickering over the screens; the second bed pushed nearer to the wall, plastic tubes running from the body to the machines.

A shock of red hair on pale blue. Kara can see Alex’s closed eyes, life flickering beneath the lids, just barely.

Super-powered aliens and almost-drowning and Worldkillers haven’t brought Alex down, Kara reminds herself, and a man with a gun won’t, either.

There are only nine minutes left.

Kara walks across the room. She takes care to tread softly, in case Alex is really sleeping. If she is, Kara says to herself, she won’t wake her up. She’ll just sit there for the remaining time, listening to her sister breathe.

Kara stops in her tracks, focusing her gaze on the ugly black boxes positioned on the tables lining the wall. She lets her eyes heat up and makes sure to burn out every. Sound blocker. Individually. Then she freezes them to avoid the singed-plastic smell irritating Alex.

Maybe it’s better if she doesn’t wake up while Kara is here. Maybe, even despite the messages, even despite the  _please come anyways_ that’s so untypical for her, Alex hates her sister now. 

Kara’s heightened sense of hearing comes back with a  _thud,_ loud and clear. With a heartbeat. Steady and unmistakable. Alex’s heartbeat. Tears burn in Kara’s eyes. She stands beside the bed, looking down on her sister. 

She knows how Alex’s heart beats when she’s asleep. This isn’t it.

Alex’s eyes open. Only now, Kara can see the phone clutched in her left hand, curled up on her chest.

“I’m sorry I didn’t text you back,” Kara blurts, and immediately clenches a hand over her mouth. “I mean, hey, Alex… I—”

“Hey, Kara,” Alex whispers. She moans quietly, squeezing her eyes together a little. Her voice is rough even at this low volume—Kara can still hear her screams ringing in her ears—but still, it pushes the tears faster into her eyes for happy reasons. She’s imagined never hearing her sister’s voice again. More accurately; she’d tried. And failed. And cried.

“How’d you get a phone anyway?” Kara asks affectionately. “Did Asha give it to you?”

“No… she got you yours. I stole it from a nurse.”

Kara nods. That tracks.

“Does it hurt?”

“What?”

“Everything?”

“Kind of, yeah. But I’m fine,” Alex adds quickly. Kara doesn’t tell her that she can tell by her heartbeat that she’s in pain, even that she’s on painkillers. It would probably sound creepy. Alex isn’t used to Kara being like this.

Kara knows that the mind wipe was a consensual decision, that Alex permitted Kara not to tell her the truth, to lie, even, but that doesn’t change the guilt nagging at her bones. The feeling of Kara taking something away from her that was hers to begin with, then making her get used to the loss, and returning it, now unwanted, unneeded.

The feeling that the helplessness that Kara so despises is something she’s now pushed on her sister. Alex has always been independent if anything, and hearing her struggle with whether to follow rules she doesn’t believe in has been… downright horrible. Like Alex was ripped into pieces and Kara can’t be sure which ones still belong to her and which ones only exist in Kara’s memory.

Alex was always more of a,  _risk getting court-martialed if I can get back to the guy who insulted my sister,_ or  _get suspended and attack Cadmus on my own_ type. Maybe it’s good she’s taking care of her life more, but Kara can’t help but feel like her sister is slipping out of her reach. 

Like the silence now. Alex’s exhausted eyes are focused on Kara, but neither of them is saying a word.

It never would have been like this, before.

Kara almost lost Alex and she hasn’t even properly said  _hello._

Kara almost lost Alex and she’s mourning for the past.

This is unacceptable.

“Can I hold your hand?” Kara blurts, fumbling a little with Alex’s blanket, then she holds out her palm, her fingers halfway to Alex’s hand that’s connected to her good shoulder, the one that’s clutching the phone.

Alex stares at it, unblinking. Then she looks up into her sister’s face. Kara imagines she must look crushed, tears gathering at the corners of her eyes, and so Alex answers, “Yeah. Yeah, of course.” But Kara can see how her hand instinctively grips the phone tighter, recoiling from the intensity in Kara’s eyes almost imperceptibly.

So, even though it breaks her heart, even though she can feel a few stray tears making their way across her cheek, she doesn’t touch Alex. She regards her sister’s face, searching for signs of relief or disappointment, finding only pain barely hidden under the surface.

She’s lost track of time. She must’ve spent at least two minutes here by now.

“I can’t stay long,” Kara says. “The guards come by every ten minutes.”

Alex scoffs. “I’m their boss, Kara.”

“But Haley—”

“Won’t be back for another twenty minutes. Besides, she’s feeling guilty. Shocking, I know, but she’s basically been tampering with my treatment ever since I woke up. First, she seemed to think she could question me better if they gave me as little painkillers as possible, because I’d just want her to tell them to give me more, then when that didn’t work she wanted them to drug me _heavily_.” 

“That’s—Alex, Rao, I’ll—” Kara’s hands clench at her sides. “I’m so sorry I didn’t come to you sooner. I was scared they’d make me leave, but I see now that I could’ve as well left if I wasn’t even there to stop Haley. I’ll _kill_ her.”

“You _won’t,_ ” Alex insists in that tone of hers that’s simultaneously a warning and a kind of amused snort. “She’s obsessed with Supergirl’s—” Alex sputters. “With your identity, it’s making her… act crazy. You know, Kara, that I made sure there weren’t any cameras or wires in this room before I texted you, right?” 

“Of course I know,” Kara promises in a quiet voice. “Alex, I’m so sorry for everything. You got shot because of me.”

“Oh, I’ve gotten shot because of me, too, it won’t be a big deal once that…” Alex closes her eyes for a moment, her jaw tense, until the wave of nausea dies down, “… damn pain wears off. That’s not what I’m conflicted about and you know that, Kara.” She frowns. “Kara’s your name, right? You didn’t lie to me about that?”

That stings. Kara has to turn her face away for a moment, trying to fend off the slight bite in Alex’s voice, and if that wasn’t enough, the underlying hurt. She grabs a white plastic chair that screeches on the tiles as she moves it next to Alex’s bed. Kara sits down, folding her hands on her lap, looking into Alex’s eyes. “When I was born on Krypton, my name was Kara Zor-El. But it’s Kara Danvers now, too.”

“And Supergirl,” Alex adds. Her teeth clench again.

“And Supergirl,” Kara confirms. When Alex doesn’t open her eyes this time, panic spikes, prickling under her skin. “Alex, are you okay? Do I need to get a doctor?”

“ _I am_ a doctor,” Alex snaps. She slowly reopens her eyes, sweat beading on her hairline. “This isn’t medical. It’s… it’s memories.” 

“What?”

“Memories… returning. Like, your favorite movie is _Wizard of Oz._ Like, once, after I killed your aunt, you broke my arm and tried to kill me. Like that I’m an intruder in your perfect world.” 

“You’ve got that all wrong,” Kara pleads. “I was poisoned by Red Kryptonite. I chose to wake up from the Black Mercy because of you. You’re my sister. Please, Alex. Look at me.”

There are tears in Alex’s eyes now, too, and it’s worse than her words, it’s worse than everything. “Supergirl burned my hand last month. But that was you, wasn’t it?”

“I’m sorry, Alex, I’m so sorry.” Kara is sobbing now, the hand wiping at her tears not quick enough to stop the flow. She feels helpless, so helpless, confronted with Alex’s hurt.

She  _told_ her. She  _told_ her this wouldn’t be a good idea, that it would hurt her, that it would hurt their relationship, and she was  _right._ She never should’ve agreed to this. She should’ve stood between Alex and J’onn and tell Alex that no position in no country on no planet was worth the loss of a sister. She should’ve been selfish and she should’ve been selfless enough to think more of the possible consequences, of future Alex lying in a medbay bed with two bullet wounds in her body. She should have—she never should have—

“Remember,” Alex whispers suddenly, letting go of the phone so it slides down on the mattress, wiping her tears away. “I’m still your sister. I’m always your sister. And I love you, no matter what.”

Kara looks up, stunned, the words so deeply enclosed in her heart she can’t help but stop crying.

“That’s the point of all the memories,” Alex whispers. “I killed your aunt and you tried to kill me and in the end, it didn’t matter. I almost died in your dream vision and in the end, you held my hand and we got out. I was horrible to you and a couple of aliens and you burned my hand and now it’s gonna be okay, too.” 

“What,” Kara gulps, breathless. “Alex, how can you say that? You don’t know me yet like you used to. You don’t have all your memories yet—”

“You pushed a spaceship back to Earth to save me,” Alex whispers. “I threw myself off a skyscraper and you were there to catch me. We fought Reign and survived. You left me for Argo and then you came back to live away from your _own mother_ that you’ve been missing for as long as I’ve known you. We persisted, right, Kara? We always did. How’s a mind wipe supposed to change that?” 

“You really remember all that?”

“Not much more, I’ll admit,” Alex laughs quietly. “Only really life-changing events for now. But it’ll come. There’s going to be a few headaches over it, but it’ll all come back.”

Kara nods, all the words she wants to say choking up her throat. “You shouldn’t have to do the reconciliation. You shouldn’t be the one cheering me on when you’re lying in that—that bed because—”

“Are you Supergirl?” Alex interrupts her, a twinkle in her eyes as she stares at Kara’s blue-red-gold attire with the big bold family crest.

“Yes.”

“Are you my sister?”

“Of course, _always._ Alex—”

“How long have you been lying to me?”

“A few months?”

“Was it for my own good?”

“I don’t know—”

“Was it for your good, or for J’onn’s, or any of your friend’s, or any single alien’s, any single person’s?”

“I suppose. Yes, yes it was,” Kara breathes.

“Apology.”

“I’m so sorry, Alex, I’m _so sorry_ —”

“Okay. I forgive you,” Alex answers softly. “Will you listen to me now?”

Kara nods mutely.

“You’re my sister. You didn’t do anything wrong. We’ll get through this. We’ll be okay.”

“Okay,” Kara whispers, smiling through tears. “I love you.”

“I love you.”

“What are we going to do now?” Kara asks, her voice catching. “The Children of Liberty know my identity. You do. You’ll be in more danger than ever.”

“Everyone will be,” Alex agrees. “But let’s just deal with that tomorrow, okay? For now—” she reaches out to Kara, palms up and shaking, “Will you hold my hand?”

“Until you fall asleep,” Kara promises, clutching Alex’s hand between her own. She shifts on her chair to find a good position, makes sure Alex is comfortable, that her vitals are steady, that the pain is bearable. And so they sit, the silence not a sign of disconnection anymore.

When Alex is already half drifted off, Kara confesses, “I’m listening to your heartbeat… I know you didn’t know that, but I hope it’s okay.”

“I never forgot that, silly Kara,” Alex mumbles, her eyes opening for the tiniest of seconds. She smiles, and Kara returns the smile brightly with a touch of teary. “And I know my science can’t prove it, but I promise I’ll always listen in for your heart, too.”

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really love writing the Danvers sisters, but damn this one took me long. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed, and I'd love to know your thoughts :)


End file.
